In All Seasons
by angelofplottwists
Summary: AU, 104. If Watanuki was oblivious to the world, the world was oblivious to him. But no music goes entirely unheard, despite the best efforts. Complete!
1. Eyes Closed

_It's another miniseries. The challenge was to pick a playlist and write a songfic for each song. These aren't precisely songfics, but they are inspired by songs. And they had to take place in San Francisco, yes.  
_

_First song: "The Atheist Christmas Carol" by Vienna Teng. I do realise it's a bit early in the season. But I don't__ really care._

* * *

You'd first noticed the flutist that October, standing under a red-leafed tree with eyes closed as if he was the only person there. In the case at his feet were a few coins. Something about him had intrigued you, so you dug in your guitar case for a few more to add to his small collection before continuing on your way home. He didn't appear to notice.

Through the month he became a regular fixture there on weekday afternoons. Regardless of your success in your own busking, you always spared him at least a few coins. You weren't exactly sure why. His music was well played, true, but so was that of the fiddler a block away and all the other street musicians you passed. You generally didn't tip the others – it was an unwritten rule that buskers didn't need to give up their earnings to each other. But there was something about this man that inspired a previously latent generous streak. Perhaps it was that his glasses looked ever so slightly bent, or simply that he never opened the eyes behind them. It could have been the shabby but impeccably clean clothes that impressed you who knew the difficulties involved with such an appearance. Or something else entirely.

When the rainstorms began in earnest in November you stopped busking every day, but when you passed by his street on the way to work in the evenings he was still there, under an overhang instead of the now-bare tree but still playing to himself. It became a habit for you to carry what spare change you had to leave him. Still he never opened his eyes as you went by, but his music would follow you down the street and hang in your ears long after you stopped actually hearing it.

You began to wonder what he did at other times, how he could afford to live in the city where nothing was cheap. He must have had a job of some kind – as you too well knew, the meager earnings a street musician could expect were nowhere near sufficient to pay rent or buy more than a few meals. You never saw him anywhere else, and although you didn't frequent too many locations in San Francisco, this was still slightly odd to you. He wasn't a student that you knew of, although obviously you did not know every student at the university and did not expect you did. No one seemed to know him, and you sometimes wondered if anyone really noticed him but you.

In December the streets were lit up and cheerful, filled once again with charity workers and carolers. The tree near where your street musician played was strung with red and white lights, and he sported a faded red scarf. Sometimes you thought you recognized a tune, some obscure holiday melody that was not played often enough to be rooted in your memory but still was familiar. You left him larger tips on Fridays when the restaurant you worked at was likely to be full. You couldn't help but notice on the second week when the scarf became a darker, more vibrant shade of red and smiled slightly to yourself as you passed by.

On Christmas Eve you had the evening off, but went out anyway with a relatively substantial wad of money in your jacket pocket. Sure enough, your flutist was at his customary nook, eyes shut and playing another one of his slightly familiar carols. You stopped and left what you supposed was your equivalent of a Christmas gift, but didn't move on afterwards. With nothing better to do, you reasoned, you might as well stay and listen to his music.

But after a few moments his song ended, and to your surprise he opened his eyes and regarded your gift with surprise. But you were captivated by your first sight of his eyes, a more brilliant blue than you'd seen outside of the summer sky. Slowly he turned toward you and your eyes met for the first time.

"You're the one who left this?" he asked in a quiet voice. You nodded. "And the other times?" he continues. Again, you nodded. To your surprise, though, he looked irritated. "I don't need charity," he said. "It's one thing to leave a couple coins once in a while like you used to, but not every day! And that is completely unnecessary," he told you, gesturing at your gift.

"It's not charity," you replied – truth. For it to be charity would have involved pity or the means to be charitable. What you left were tokens of appreciation, appreciation you began to have the idea that no one else expressed.

He was taken aback. "It's – what?" he asked, a confused expression settling on his face. "What do you mean?"

"I can't afford to be charitable," you explained. "Consider it a gift."

"So you can't afford charity but you can afford to give gifts to strangers?" he demanded. "Where is the logic in that?"

"Merry Christmas," you offered by way of explanation.


	2. Clear Sky

_Second song: "Mission Street", also by Vienna Teng_.

* * *

His eyes are closed when you walk by the next afternoon, but they snap open and glare at you when you leave your customary tip. He maintains his fierce look when you don't move on again, although it looks strained and you wonder if he's really trying that hard to dislike you. You find the idea that he is to be strangely compelling, perhaps because if he has to try there's a good chance he'll fail. For some reason, you want this man to like you. It's probably the same reason that you left him your spare change every day you passed by.

"Don't you have somewhere to be?" he inquires irritably when it's been several minutes and you haven't gone anywhere. "I mean, it _is_ Christmas after all, time of family and large dinners that if you can't afford to be charitable you probably can't afford to miss out on. What are you doing out _here_?"

"What about you?" you counter, lacking a real reason. You suspect 'because I chose to be' would not go down well, however true a response it is.

"I asked you first!" he snaps, and you have a feeling you've found a sore spot. So there is something wrong about his family. Somehow you will piece this man together, figure him out, and maybe then you will understand why you're so drawn to him – and why he's so determined to dislike you.

"I felt like it," you tell him, partially because it's the truth and partially because as you suspected earlier it will not be well received.

You're right about the reception. "What kind of an answer is that? You're out here in the cold on one day when no one in their right mind is on their own, and hanging around to bother me _because you felt like it_?" he demands, waving his arms to further drive his point home. You sidestep out of range of the flute, which is metal and will probably cause injury if it hits you.

"You're out here too," you point out.

"Maybe I had no choice!" he snaps in return. "Just because _some_ of us have a place to be doesn't mean we all do!"

"I never said I had somewhere to be," you tell him, storing away what he's just said with all the other things you've learned about this strange man. He is thrown off by the admission, though, and you wonder if it even occurred to him that you could be in similar straits as he is. It's understandable, you suppose. You _have_ been leaving him money for a while, so it would be logical to assume that you possessed some sort of successful life. Logical, but largely incorrect, although you don't really have any objections with your life. Especially recently that it's become that much more interesting.

"Don't you?" he asks, and you shrug. It's not as if you're lacking a place to be, but it's not a place that would be any more worth being than here. You're far from home here in this city, and while you've made acquaintances, there aren't any you would consider to be friends. You wonder if he's not in the same situation you are, or at least a similar one. Estranged from his family, far from them, or perhaps lacking one altogether, it would seem. A kinship between you and he, then, and perhaps one he can see.

"I only know two people here," he tells you, sounding surprised to hear himself speaking the words. "One of them is visiting family out of town. The other…is a worse fate than spending the day out here."

You make up your mind then, although you hadn't been aware of the process beginning. "Do you need to be here?" you ask him.

"I don't need to be anywhere," he replies.

"Come with me," you tell him, turning around in the direction of your apartment building. Behind you he grumbles incoherently but packs his flute away into its case and follows. A few drops of rain begin to fall as you and he begin to walk, and he speeds up to match you.

"I don't want to get any more damp than I need to," he grumbles as if to explain himself. Unnecessarily, because you read between the lines and know you've just won something in the contest that's somehow grown between you and he. What it is that you've won remains to be seen.

You make it home, but not before it begins to rain in earnest. Despite your street musician's apparent preferences you are both beyond damp and somewhere between wet and soaked. It is at this point that you realise you don't even know his name.

He seems to have come to a similar conclusion. "If I'm in your home, I should know your name," he states. "I don't generally make a habit of following total strangers home."

Another point for you, you muse. "Doumeki Shizuka," you tell him.

"Watanuki Kimihiro," he responds in a voice miraculously devoid of irritation or resentment. "And why did you ask me to follow you here?"

You had thought it was obvious, but apparently not. "You said you had nowhere better to be," you point out.

"This is supposed to be better?"

You shrug again. "Tea?" Not waiting for an answer, you walk into the small kitchen and set the kettle to boil. When you return, he's scrutinising your bookshelves, carrying jacket and scarf in one arm and looking out of place in your sparse apartment. Somehow, the only place you can really see him at home in would be cluttered with things – but neat. Even a stranger like you can tell that Watanuki could not be anything but neat.

He's probably got an obsessive-compulsive streak.

"You can sit down," you tell him, amused to see him start in surprise when he hears you. He really didn't know you were there. You wonder if he's this oblivious to everything that goes on around him, and wonder how's he's survived this long if this is so. But then you remember the near-empty flute case you've grown to know over the past few months and realise that if he's oblivious to the world around him, it is just as oblivious to him.

He sits gingerly on the nearest chair, as if he fears it will break. "You play guitar?" he asks after a while, nodding at the case propped in a corner. "I've never seen you playing."

You nod, lacking anything worth saying but acknowledging a reply. Watanuki will be tough shell to crack, and until crack he does his actions will be as closed and difficult to respond to as his statements. But you have a feeling it will be worth it.

The kettle whistles and you go to see about tea, content in the knowledge that he'll be there when you return in a few minutes. Out the window, you can see a spot of blue to the north. You find it doesn't compare at all to the eyes that are probably glaring in your direction from the other room.


	3. Approaching

_Third song: "High and Dry" by Radiohead._

* * *

That January, you succeeded in drawing Watanuki into several conversations which could have been construed as informative if not friendly. You learned that he worked for a woman by name of Ichihara Yuuko, who was in his words "filthy rich" but did not pay him. She apparently provided him with somewhere to sleep and the means to feed himself, in exchange for which Watanuki cleaned the house, cooked and ran errands during the morning and early afternoon. It didn't seem like such a good deal on Watanuki's part, but he did hint at something else he received from the arrangement. When you pressed him for details, though, he was remarkably elusive. 

So you circled around the question and prodded him until he rearranged his words to let you see through. Slowly you began to see who he was beyond the street musician with the striking eyes who nobody seemed to notice but you.

He began to openly wait for you as February rolled around, suffered you to spend time with him and even allowed you to take him to dinner on nights you didn't work. On the fourteenth he went so far as to ask your help in finding several elusive brands of liquor that his boss had requested for the Valentine party she was apparently throwing. After a prolonged search of all the liquor stores in the area, all but one of these were located and you were very nearly late to work.

The next day, he gave you a box that you were informed contained leftovers from the party. "For helping to find those bottles," he said sullenly, not meeting your eyes. You had a feeling that nothing you could say would be taken well in this circumstance, and so did not say anything or open the box. He was offended, or said he was. You somehow had the feeling that a great deal of his reaction was habitual, as if he had been trying to dislike you long enough that it was subconscious. You weren't sure whether to feel flattered or not, but when you returned home that night and discovered that either Ichihara Yuuko's guests had not been very hungry or these were not leftovers after all, you did feel gratified.

On the third of March you did not leave him a tip but told him to come along with you, skillfully ignoring his protests. He grumbled at you throughout the ride on BART but was silenced for a short duration when you made clear your destination: a place called the Last Supper Club. After a few moments of quiet, though, he regained balance and demanded to know why you were here and why he had been brought along.

"It's my birthday," you told him. Perhaps he remembered Christmas, or perhaps he simply knew better than to expect a reply, because he did not ask why that should involve him. You were relieved, because you honestly had no idea how to answer that, except that he was the only person that you really would want to have along. Perhaps he was a friend. You hadn't thought about the possibility before, but now it seemed obvious.

He didn't say anything on the subject of his presence or your birthday, but you wondered if he was thinking about it. He did seem unnaturally pensive that night.

You were proved correct the next day, when he turned up at your apartment early in the morning before you left for the university. Dangling from his arm was a bag containing what looked like another box, which he thrust toward to. "For your birthday," he explained, again not meeting your eyes. You could not restrain the slight smile his actions provoked.

"When's yours?" you asked him later that month. He stared for a minute, apparently confused by the sudden and meaningless question. You clarified, "Your birthday."

"April first," he muttered, and you were sure you didn't imagine the slightest tinge of pink in his face before he turned away.


	4. A Strange Fit

_I'd forgotten to post this here as well. I'm getting really bad about this whole FFN business...sorry, guys. Review?_

_Fourth song: "Eric's Song" once again by Vienna Teng. _

* * *

As the weather lightened, you returned to busking on your off-days. It became a routine that each time you walked by, you would nod and he would glare right back. You weren't sure how he always knew exactly when to open his eyes, but suspected that he cheated and looked ahead for you. It was nice to think at least that you caused him to pay a little more attention, not only to you but also the world in general. 

On the first of April, you didn't leave him spare change but a wrapped package that he didn't acknowledge in your vision until the next day. But on the second of April when you passed by it was not a flute case but a hat upturned in front of him, and you smiled to yourself and dropped your offering in, where it landed with a thump and three clinks.

The temperature climbed steadily through April and May, and then your classes abruptly ended for the summer. You had planned to catch the Greyhound bus south, to one of the surfing towns where you could catch some waves for a day, and though your plans seemed to have been eternally interrupted, you don't see why this one would not work out. Watanuki, of course, was less than convinced until you presented him with the total cost of the trip. He agreed to think about it, which you recognised as his delusional attempt to save face by not agreeing too easily. As expected, the next day he announced his reluctant willingness and mumbled something about bus fares being taken care of by his boss.

(You learned later that his boss had threatened dire things if he did not accompany you, and furthermore took the payment for the bus from his paycheck; this was ever so slightly offending but mostly endearing that he went along with it anyway. But when you asked him about it later, he averted his eyes and muttered about how you didn't know her well enough to fully understand.)

So it followed that one foggy morning in mid-June you and he caught a Greyhound bus south and over Highway 17 to the university town of Santa Cruz to surf for the day. You hadn't been here for several years now, but he was completely foreign to the area. And to your disappointment but lack of real surprise, he did not surf. Neither did he particularly wish to learn, but instead sat on the sand and engaged himself in a doomed glaring competition with the ocean as you, wetsuit-clad and clutching a rented surfboard, took to the waves.

After a few hours had passed in this manner and the fog had begun to burn off, you paddled back to shore to cut the yet-continuing glaring contest short by transferring Watanuki's irritation back to you. "What," he demanded at your intrusion, "isn't it enough to drag me out here? Do you need to come bother me as well?"

"Why did your boss want you to come with me?" you asked instead of replying

"Ah – she said I needed to 'expand my horizons'," he mumbled.

"Come on, then."

He stared blankly at your proffered hand before catching on. "Are you out of your _mind_?" he demanded. "You know I can't surf! And there's only one board anyway." Thinking he had won, perhaps, he folded his arms and resettled himself, but you weren't quite finished yet.

"It's not hard to learn," you told him. "Unless you really think you can't."

As you had expected, his competitive nature – at least, in regards to you – kicked in, and his glare shifted from stubborn to outraged. "What are you implying? That _you_ think I can't? I'm sure I could surf much better than someone like _you_ ever could." Radiating irritation, he stood up and stalked to the water's edge. Smirking now, you followed him.

He nearly jumped back when the first wave of cold ocean water hit his knees, and you remember the reason that every surfer was wearing a wetsuit – the Pacific Ocean was _frigid_. But he glanced backwards at you and walked forwards once more.

Out in the water, as you waited your turn, you showed him how to stand on the board. He _hmphed_ and pretended not to listen, but when it came his turn for a wave he climbed up properly, if awkwardly. For a glorious moment he was standing on the curve of the wave, looking intently at the tip of his board and standing at his full height. Then he wobbled ever so slightly, flailed his arms wildly, and wiped out with a cut-off cry.

You swam over, concerned despite yourself, but both he and the board surfaced in one piece and his face was set in determination. "I almost had it," he told you. "I'll get it next time, I know it!"

He tried four more times with no better results, the other surfers shouting mixed encouragement and jeers. Then, shivering by that time, he sat out a few rounds while you took your own turn with the board. By your third wave, Watanuki was glaring at you in the way he did whenever he interpreted your actions as winning competition.

"I could hold you up," you finally offered, bringing the board back to the shore. He declined aggressively and tried again. After another spectacular wipeout, he grudgingly changed his mind.

"But only once," he grumbled. "Then I'll do it on my own."

You would wonder later if the extent of your relationship would be failures to hold to the "just once" rule; now you simply climbed on the surfboard behind him and planted your feet, clamping your hands around his ribs where no offense could possibly be taken. Nevertheless you felt his scowl, a well-known expression that you had come to recognise as the closest thing to agreement that you would ever receive from him at this point in time.

But the water was blue and cool and his skin quickly sapped the remaining warmth from your hands, another type of offering that you didn't mind making at all. You were more than a little surprised to find that you were comfortable here – more than that, everything made sense on a board in the blue. You could see yourself doing this again, holding him upright, letting your body heat seep away to a colder person, and maybe – if you stayed around long enough – seeing him thaw just a little.

You didn't wipe out, but both stayed upright to the end of the wave. And when he tried again, you couldn't help but feel proud of him when he kept to his feet for the entirety of the time.


	5. No Catharsis

_And about time, you (the reader) say._

_Please review. If nothing else, it reminds me of the story and makes me want to write more. I love an audience. _

* * *

The rest of the summer was defined by a marked change in his behaviour towards you. While it was hardly _friendly_ – in any normal sense of the word, at least – Watanuki appeared to have given up on keeping you and he apart. Whether this was due to resignation or genuine warming-up to you, you didn't know; you didn't really care. You couldn't really imagine Watanuki without his prickles and suspected that the only time they disappeared was when he curled tightly enough that they blended together and completely closed him off. In a strange way, you supposed, the prickles were a sign of trust.

You were aware that Watanuki-analysis had become a hobby of yours lately, but didn't really think too much of it beyond the fact that you enjoyed having a friend. It was even worth the requirement that you now be social – to a certain extent – and of course the omnipresent prickles.

Life continued. The bar you worked at hired a new hostess, who quickly took to giggling with several of the other girls who worked there. You ignored them for the most part rather than deal with actual conversation, if one could call it that, but a few weeks into her induction to the staff the new hostess approached you herself as you finished your shift.

"Uh… it's Doumeki, right?" she asked nervously. You hadn't bothered telling anyone your first name, so without any confusion you nodded. "I was, like, wondering if you were doing anything after work?"

You nodded again. You had plans to go home, maybe study, but definitely sleep.

"Oh." She looked disappointed for a moment, and then plowed on. "With your girlfriend, huh?"

"No," you said."

"You don't have a girlfriend?"

"I don't."

Her hopeful smile returned, and you sighed inwardly, recognising the signs that the time for a solid rejection was close at hand. "Then are you busy tomorrow night?" she inquired too casually.

"I'm not interested. I apologise," you told her before she could get her hopes any more than she already had.

She sighed in dejection. "Who _are_ you interested in?" she asked, glancing around the room as if she could learn the answer if she looked hard enough. "Any of the girls_here_?"

"No," you told her once more. It was the truth, after all. Romance had never been a priority for you, and as for interest… the way she meant it, you were unattached. But your "interests" lay elsewhere, in your schooling and your music. You didn't see the appeal in adding yet another element to the structure of your days.

"Oh. I'm sorry about that, then," she said, as if lack of a love life was a real loss. Then she gave you a look that could only be called speculative. "Unless… are you gay?"

For a moment you considered telling her yes simply to end the conversation, but with how the things had gone so far such a statement would only fuel the fire. And you really didn't see the point in lying about something like that, anyway. Your lack of interest was equal opportunity. "No," you said. "I'm simply not interested."

She stared at you as if such a concept was unthinkable, and you took the opportunity to make your exit before anything else could be asked or speculated about your nonexistent love life. You wondered why you had somehow earned the notice of not only she but many of the hostesses who had worked at the bar, despite an indifference that surely should have been easy to see. And you thought about it, and wondered why you didn't really have an interest n people at all – not only romantically, but simply in general.

That wasn't entirely true, though. There was Watanuki, after all, who had somehow caught and held your interest since last autumn. The hostess probably would have gone wild drawing all manner of conclusions from such knowledge.

And who knows, you found yourself thinking some time later in late August, having coaxed Watanuki into yet another picnic in the Golden Gate Park – she might even have been right.

The idea was crazy and you never would have considered it for a second before that surfing trip, but now it ate at your consciousness and pointed things out that you had missed before. The fact that first and foremost he _did _spark your interest. The way that you had taken to searching his every statement and action for hidden meaning by habit. The fact that you knew him well enough to do so. The way you remembered feeling those few times that he had heard _your_ music, and the way that his was important enough to you never tired of it. The way that he'd so easily become a part of your routine that you never once looked back or regarded the change in distaste.

You didn't really know much about love, but if what you thought you did was true… forget maybes, you realised. You were smitten.

And that was that. You'd expected a much more staggering catharsis if anything, something much more momentous than the simple "oh." But that was all it was. The sun rose in the west, buses were always late on Fridays, and you were apparently in love with Watanuki. It made a great deal of sense when you thought about it. But the realisation changed nothing but definitions.

"You've been staring into space for the past five minutes!" complained Watanuki himself, waving a hand in front of your face. "Is something wrong, or are you just out of thoughts in that useless head of yours?"

"It's nothing," you replied, because to him it was, and because you read the actual interest and potential concern in his voice. Yes, you could understand him. Yes, that mattered a great deal – to you. And that was really enough.


	6. Every Season

_Shamelessly written to 'Seasons of Love' from RENT. And yes, Doumeki in this universe has seen it. He's a more artsy type than his canon counterpart._

_Review, please! _

* * *

You were taken by surprised when the first leaves started to go orange on the streets you walked. Watanuki would play as usual underneath one tree, and you began to have to suppress the desire to pluck fallen leaves from his hair or his clothing. The weather was yet hot, but the trees promised that sooner rather than later this would cease to be so. 

It had been a year.

This shook you far more than the summer's epiphany had. A whole year. Only a year. Looking back, you realised that the small changes – changes that had seemed so small at the time – had completely transformed the way you lived. A year ago, you dropped spare change in some man's flute case because he vaguely caught your eye. Now – you glanced at him and smiled slightly – now suddenly he had become the axis on which your world turned. And he had done so without intent, without desire, simply by existing. It seemed as it were inevitable that you and he meet, for nothing had happened by conscious thought.

It was, as Watanuki remarked about something else, "hitsuzen." He was actually talking about the change of the seasons and change in the passersby.

"I asked my boss about this elderly woman I see passing by," he commented. "She looked… I don't know. Sad, maybe. But beyond that. And Yuuko said, 'It isn't something you can affect.' I wasn't sure what she meant."

"What_did_ she mean?" you inquired.

He didn't have a prickly reply, which meant that he was actually thinking quite a bit. "She said, 'The events in her life are_hitsuzen_. Inevitable. Something directly influenced by what has happened before, and a course already set.' I asked if there was anything I could do…" He shrugged. "She said no. That as I am… I can't do a thing."

"As you are?" you asked, definitely curious and not in spite of yourself at all.

"The reason no one notices me," he said. "Surely you've no…ticed…" Then he stared at you as if realising something for the first time. "Wait – how _do_ you notice?"

Realisation began to dawn. "Notice you?" you asked. "I have since last autumn." Although you never properly noticed him until that Christmas. But you didn't think that was quite what he meant, unless he had an ability to read minds you hadn't previously known about.

"No one else has," he muttered.

"Hitsuzen?" you offered, and he looked incredulous and surprised as if the possibility never would have occurred to him.

And really, you thought later, it did seem like something that would have happened based on the patterns of your lives, disregarding intentions entirely. You weren't sure what kept others from noticing Watanuki, but you were happy that you at least had reaped the benefits of being the only one. Someday, you vowed, you would meet this Yuuko and get the whole story.

It was a few days later that he remarked, "Today is exactly a year since you noticed."

"You remembered?" you inquire, rather impressed with his sudden display of memory.

"It was a momentous occasion," he sniffed, looking away. "That someone actually dropped coins in the flute case. It was the first time anyone besides Yuuko noticed me since people stopped."

It was a statement that begged a question, but he was vague with the reply to yours, retorting that obviously he wasn't _born_ this way and he had once had a perfectly normal life, thank you very much. You weren't sure if he was keeping things to himself, or he simply didn't know what had happened to him.

But exactly a year was something special. You took him out to dinner that night and fondly ignored the protestations and demands to see the tab.

You had been too busy living that year to really realise how time passed, though you had definitely noted its passage. You'd counted by months, sometimes by days, but after a while things began to blur into moments and memories. Watanuki. He had made up your year, this year. It was like the song from RENT: "measure your life in love."

You thought it would be the best possible outcome if you could continue to count by memories, if Watanuki could continue to be the foundation of time's passage. He was stuck with you at this point, yes, but you would have liked to think that maybe, possibly, someday he would seek you out. And maybe, possibly, someday he would come to understand how much this mattered to you.

And maybe, possibly, hopefully – someday he would not only understand, but also reciprocate.

Autumn, you felt, was the season of beginnings. Another year of university – your last unless you chose to seek your master's degree – was due to begin. The first time you'd come to the City to live was a September four years ago. And of course, you'd met Watanuki exactly a year ago. That in itself was a milestone, a beginning of something you didn't think – at least, you hoped not – would end anytime soon.


	7. Eyes Open

_This isn't really part of the story, but I thought it was worth adding to the end. You'll notice that the story is now 'Complete.' Don't be too sad, though - I'm nowhere near finished with this universe. _

_On another note, I wrote the song Doumeki sings, and if you search for the band 'xariigl' on Virb, you can listen to it. It's called "Perfect Little Tremors."_

_Please do review! And thank you for sticking around for the ride. I loved writing this story, and I hope you loved reading it. _

* * *

You've stopped being anything but amused in finding him standing in the rain with his flute, although these days he actually has a few tips to show for it. Nevertheless, when on the twenty-eighth of December you found him in his usual spot, you once again dragged him underneath your umbrella and subsequently back to your flat. He didn't protest but merely sulked the whole way there, to your profound shock. 

"I was actually making money out there," he informed you redundantly upon reaching your destination. "You'd better have a damn good reason for pulling me away."

Fortunately, you did have one in mind. "I wrote a song," you told him matter-of-factly. He looked surprised, and though he hid it well, you could tell it was in a pleased sort of way. Either he'd slipped, or you've become better at reading him. You weren't sure which option you'd prefer more.

"So you're going to make me listen to it," he guessed, to all appearances in resignation. You didn't believe the show at all.

To answer, you simply pulled out your guitar and tuned it, and he sighed. "I don't know why I put up with you," he informed the universe in general, but did not move from his perch on your sole couch.

Satisfied with your tuning, you hesitated over the title and decided in the end to leave it out. Instead, you simply began to play; it was a simple tune, something you'd written with him in mind. You wondered if he'd notice this, and decided it didn't matter.

"_You stood untouchable, perfect in every damn mistake…_"

His eyes didn't leave your face, and you could feel them on you as you watched the fretboard. The one time you did look up, he was looking away, but once again you didn't fall for it. You'd been watching him for too long for those tricks to work.

"_And I've tried to understand you, I've tried to pull you out of your shell…_"

You looked up at him at that line, and whether he met your eyes in surprise, realisation, or something else entirely you weren't sure. But he did, and for a moment you were caught up in the utter perfection of his gaze.

Your fingers slipped on the strings.

You managed to recover, but he definitely heard and as you looked back down you caught a glimpse of his expression – confused, but thoughtfully so. Suddenly you wondered if maybe this had been a mistake, too forward, if he wasn't going to be ready to understand what you meant to say. But it was too late to stop now, and the way he dealt with the world, he probably wouldn't have noticed unless there was a good possibility that he would be able to deal with the consequences of doing so. Or so you hoped.

You finished the rest of the song without further mishap, and as the tones of the final chord died away you looked up again to find his eyes squarely on you.

"That song," he began, "what is it about?"

At this point, you doubted the question was in anything but a desire for confirmation. "You," you told him.

"Oh," he said. Then he added awkwardly, "It was a nice song."

"Thank you," you replied.

"And you, ah, I mean, it was…"

"Written for you," you supplied, beginning to enjoy yourself despite the amount at stake.

"Right," he mumbled, going a very bright red.

A few minutes passed in which he appeared to think this over. You left him to stew and made the now customary pot of tea. By the time you returned, the change in colouration had mostly subsided, although he no longer would look you in the eyes. When you offered a mug, he did move to accept it, but when the tips of his fingers brushed yours they pulled back sharply.

"Um," he said, turning red again. You put the mug down on the makeshift table and he reached for it once you had pulled your own hand back. "Do you, um, want a response?" he asked.

"I don't need one," you told him. You would have liked one, but you had a feeling that he needed time to come to grips with things like this. A delay wouldn't kill you. You hoped a rejection wouldn't either.

The answer seemed to surprise him, although what prompted his next words you would never be sure. "But you'd like one, right? I mean, even you don't go dragging people places to listen to a song written to_them_ if you don't want a response. Um." He finally looked up, as if forcing himself to do so, and continued, "If you mean what I – what I think you mean, then, then this is… I mean, yes."

"Yes what?" you inquired, even as your heart leapt into your throat with the hope that what he was trying to say was that he reciprocated.

"Yes-I-accept-what-you-said," he said very quickly. Then he shook his head. "That didn't come out right. Um. I mean." He adopted an annoyed expression. "Why can't you just understand what I'm trying to tell you?!"

"If I assume, it'll be biased by what I _want_ to hear," you explained reasonably.

"But it _is _what you want to hear!" he burst out. "I mean, I think it is." He glared at you now, full on, no holds barred. "Dammit, why is it so difficult just to say that I feel the same way!" He blushed a brighter red than he had yet and abruptly noticed he'd risen from his seat, sitting down and looking mortified with himself.

"Beats me," you told him over the surge of elation, and to keep yourself from doing something rash poured your own mug of tea.

"Is that all you have to say about it?" he muttered. "Aren't we supposed to, um, do something now?"

You would have been content to bask in your own euphoria for the rest of the day, but his demands were not exactly taxing on said euphoria. "As in?" you inquired, because nothing much on your part had changed and seeing him flustered was twice as amusing now that you knew why.

"Um," he said expressively, waving his hands as if to depict what he meant but failing. "You know."

If he were to go any redder, you had a feeling that he would pass out on blood overload in the brain. To spare him, you sidestepped the table and joined him on the couch, reaching over that final stretch of space between and kissed him.

"That?" you asked a bit later.

"Shut up," he told you. You complied.


End file.
